Be Happy, Alice
by Caley1.9
Summary: The vampire who changes Alice leaves her no information, just a note telling her to be happy. This is a series of one-shots exploring how her life upholds that injunction. JA. Update: Alice finds Jasper after he almost kills Bella in New Moon. R and R!
1. The Beginning

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

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You might question my decision to work in an insane asylum. I question it myself. I am ashamed that I allowed morbid curiosity to influence my life…particularly when, as a vampire, morbidity is hardly lacking in my day-to-day affairs, without even having to search for it.

The solace I can offer myself is that I saved a life. I saved an innocent girl from even more suffering that she had already endured. Perhaps, after all the mental and emotional anguish she had experienced, physical pain would pale in comparison. Regardless, I could not allow her to be tortured, killed, and drained of her life.

I well remember the day little Mary Alice Brandon was given up by her parents. It was gray and overcast, a bitingly cold wind adding to the bleak atmosphere. The Brandons arrived in their shiny black automobile- they were among the wealthiest family in Biloxi.

I cannot pretend I was surprised that they were finally abandoning their daughter. Few people had ever seen her, for it was well-known that she was "not quite right", a blight, as her parents saw it, on their sterling reputation and good name.

I was shocked, however, when I saw the tiny girl- her stature belied her age of nearly twenty- almost pushed from the auto by her coldly lovely mother.

Her father gingerly clutched the shoulder of her black dress, as though afraid that whatever afflicted her could be passed through physical contact. He did nothing to shield her from the gusts that blew her long, inky black hair about her face and buffeted her tiny frame as she shivered violently from fear and cold.

Abruptly she stopped, her eyes glazing over and her shivers transforming instantaneously into statue-like stillness. Her delicate hands, clenched so tightly even a human could see her veins from a distance, hung by her sides. I could hear her heart fluttering and her sweet, sweet scent filled my head.

Her father looked at her in revulsion and jerked her roughly. She blinked, and turned her shockingly blue eyes on me with a question that I did not understand in her gaze. I stared back, equally intrigued and saddened by this elfin creature being cast off by her parents.

The matron offered Brandon a lock of his daughter's hair after it had been shorn off, but he refused with an expression of distaste. I could have killed him in that moment, ripped his callous heart from his chest as his daughter said, in a voice like a bell, "Papa."

He raised a haughty eyebrow at the tears threatening to spill from her eyes. "Please," she whispered. She stretched her small hand toward him, trembling again.

Brandon pivoted sharply and returned to his wife without even a final glance at his child.

The treatments were terrible. She was given electrical shocks each time she had a vision, the theory being that if she associated the visions with pain she would stop having them…sheer idiocy. When this did nothing beyond making her writhe in agony, she was placed in seclusion, in the dark, in the hope that sensory deprivation was the antidote to her vision. I was appalled as I never had been before to see her treated thus. I refused to take part. I did not believe, not for a moment, that she was insane.

Her blood never tempted me. I could not bear to think of her broken in my arms, my eyes bright red with her life force. I rejected the possibility, going against my nature. I could never harm her. She was too precious.

I stole into her dark cell every night, when most of the workers were home and no one was likely to check on her. At first she was too pained, too lost, too afraid, to acknowledge my presence at all. I held her, a blanket between us to keep her warm, night after night, hour after hour. It seemed like mere seconds to me, but I could feel that every minute was a hopeless eternity for her.

I felt as her vision stole through her body, causing her to tense up in misery. I rubbed her back, desperate to soothe her in any way that I could. She had not spoken since her first day, nor had she cried…she did nothing but shake. She rarely even bothered to open her eyes anymore, since the darkness was absolute to her.

I spoke to her. I told her it would be over someday. I told her that her parents had been wrong. I told her she deserved much better.

I told her she was Alice.

"Do you know what Alice means, little one?" I murmured into the shadows, gently stroking her skinny arm. "It means 'truthful'. And you are. You are not mad. Your visions are true." I kissed the top of her head. "Be strong, Alice."

She acknowledged me with words only once, and I treasure that memory beyond any other from my human past or this existence that I will lose so soon.

Slender to begin with, the darkness and cold and constant shivering were breaking her. She barely ate or drank. She wasted away before me as I pondered changing her. It seemed the only way…she could die in her distressing cell or I could deliver her from its depths, return her to society…where she would be shunned again. Or I could change her. The decision tortured me, and my mind was not made up until she spoke.

"You're going to save me," she said softly, her head resting on my stone chest. Her bell of a voice was just as beautiful as it had been, if weaker.

"What?" I said back, holding her more tightly to me. Dear Alice.

"I saw it…that day. You're going to save me."

She drifted off to sleep then, her breaths barely deep enough to expand her lungs. She was dying. Poor little Alice was dying in a dank cell while she should have been out in the world, marveling in the beauty her lovely eyes beheld.

I was going to save her.

I didn't know it then, but I learned I was rescuing her not only from death in the asylum but also a gruesome death at the hands, and teeth, of a brutal tracker. Alice's sweet blood drew James to her, just as it enchanted me, but he had none of my pity and love for the girl. I just managed to escape with her before she succumbed to either fate.

I ran with her to a wooded area, praying that I would not be too late to save her. My right hand under hers legs and the other around her back, I could feel her bones and the blood slowing in her veins as her heart struggled to keep beating. Suddenly, her tiny hand was wrapped around my finger and I knew she was trying to hold onto more than me.

"You have to be brave," I said gently, settling her on the ground in the shelter of some trees. "I have to hurt you."

I bent to press my lips to her forehead. "Alice," I murmured. Those sapphire eyes opened for the last time and my heart, though stone-still for a century, broke into a million pieces for this little girl who had stolen it away.

I pressed my teeth to her throat and wrists, savoring her scent but in no danger of losing control. Not with someone I loved. Stroking her cheek one last time, and leaving anote behind me, I left Alice and went to fight James.

He'll be back shortly to burn me. Of course his anger at me for taking his prize is great, but I could not let him have Alice.

I hope she won't remember any of this. I hope she forgets her family, the pain, the dark, and me. I hope she finds others to love her as I did, and as her parents should have. I hope her future is bright, and that she obeys my note.

Be happy, Alice.

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	2. Scars

Summary: Jasper worries about Alice's reaction the first time she sees all of his scars.

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Usually my reaction to stares at my scars is defiance. I know they make me look like a troublemaker, a rogue, and I tend to smirk at the expressions of fear, shock, and disapproval. It's partially to cover my embarrassment at my wild past, but it also serves to protect me from the pain of rejection. If I react before I have a chance to feel their emotions, the rejection doesn't resonate so strongly. I rejected them first with my attitude.

I remember raising my eyebrows at Carlisle and Esme the first time they saw me, daring them to comment or turn me away because of my appearance. Of course they didn't. I did not have as clear a picture of what we were walking into as Alice, and I could not comprehend their intensely loving ways.

Alice…Alice is the only one I've ever met who did not stiffen at the sight of me, did not stare, did not emanate any unease whatsoever. And yet I feared her reaction more than anything else. Ever.

She did not grimace at my face and hands, true. But that is as meaningless as someone with arachnophobia not screaming at the sight of a single spider. If they were confronted by a veritable torrent of spiders, the calm would not last. Alice could handle my largely unscarred face and the backs of my hands. Seeing the thousands upon thousands of crescents that covered me would be another story altogether.

I was a mess of nerves before our first time together, but not for the typical reasons. Alice had brightened my life beyond what I'd ever dreamed was possible. Her happiness was so complete, so intense, so pure, that once I had tasted it, I did not think I could survive long in its absence. And I knew that the evidence of my misdeeds would be too much for her, and she would leave. I would be doomed to torment again, because I knew I had no hope of remaining a "vegetarian" without her…I would again feel the fear of my victims, knowing I was taking away their joys and plans and loves. I would drown in my guilt, and it would be no more than I deserved.

The selfish part of me, which is larger than I'd like to admit, urged me to make Alice wait until night to see me, as if the darkness would affect her eyes like a human's, and she would not see me so clearly. I convinced myself against it, however, telling myself that she might as well get the full force of seeing my sins so clearly etched in my skin. Then she would never have reason to regret leaving me. She would know she took the only possible course of action. Someone as good as Alice deserves so much better than a monster.

In the end, Alice approached me just as the sun was rising. We did not discuss it beforehand; like nearly everything with Alice, it came to pass probably because she had seen that it would, and she simply followed the path she knew her life would take. Even though that path led her into my arms.

We lay beside a river. To anyone else, its voice would have been soothing. To me, it seemed like the rushing in my ears foreboded the end of my time with Alice…the end of my life. I struggled to drown it out, to no avail. If my heart had not been frozen in time, it would have been pounding. I could barely draw breaths. The thought of losing her filled me and threatened to send me over the edge into insanity.

I was quite still, despite my nerves, and Alice must have noticed the statue beside her, but she did not say anything about it. In fact, she said nothing at all for a long time. She did not even seem to expect me to move.

Slowly, carefully, she began to unbutton my shirt. I could not meet her eyes, afraid of the instant when her gaze would change from one of love to one of fear. It would be enough…no, far too much…to feel it. I could not face seeing it as well.

I mentally counted down the buttons, adding another clock of impending despair to the noise of the river. When she reached the last one, I actually closed my eyes. I felt her push the material aside, and I knew, without looking, that her eyes were fixed on the countless raised marks, each one an exclamation of why I was not good for her…why I was no good for anyone. I held my breath, waiting to hear the rush of her speeding away, never to look back. Waiting to feel the absence of her happiness, feel the darkness closing in around me.

Instead, I felt her breath on my face. "Jasper," she whispered, her lips fluttering across my eyelids. Her tiny hands came to rest on my chest, and I jumped at her touch. I felt her smile.

And I felt her amusement at my flinch, such a human motion in her eyes. I felt her happiness…still. Always.

I felt her peace.

I felt her love.

I opened my eyes, utterly astounded. "A-Alice?" I asked, stumbling over her name in my absolute consternation. I felt her love. I felt her love? Why? How?

She smiled at me, the sunrise behind her paling in beauty compared to the expression on her face. "I love _you_, Jasper."

My eyes widened and I tried to think of something to say, but words failed me. Smirking, but in an entirely different manner from my bitter reaction to being seen for what I was, she leaned forward and kissed my nose.

Then her face changed. Her mood changed. The happiness was still there, the love was still, inexplicably, there, but a wave of sadness washed over me as well. Her gaze met mine, and the depth of compassion in her unfailingly tawny eyes made my own eyes burn with impossible tears. She lowered herself so her face was even with my chest, and she touched her lips to a scar just below my ribcage. The first one I ever got, though I have no idea how she knew.

It had been inflicted by Maria, when I defied her the first time she ordered me to kill another newborn. I understood what it was like to be out of control; indeed, I could feel the girl's confusion and desperation at the situation she so suddenly found herself in. I pitied her, and argued to give her another chance. Maria was not pleased, and she punished me before making me kill the girl. "You're mine, and you follow my instructions," she said harshly, turning her back on me.

I closed my eyes again at the memory, wishing I could be free of the poison of my past.

"You're mine now," Alice said softly, and my eyes snapped open. There she was, wonderful little Alice, and she claimed me. Despite what I was. Despite what I had been.

She caught my eye for a moment, and then she kissed the scar again. And somehow, the poison was gone.

One by one, she brought her soft lips to my ravaged skin and forgave me. Over and over. Four thousand twenty-one times.

"Alice," I finally managed to say, as she lay against me, her head on my chest and her fingers tracing patterns of her own choosing, not at all influenced by the grid of crescent lines, on my skin. "You deserve…better. I'm not enough for you."

She lifted her head and glared at me. "I just claimed you, didn't I? You know how possessive I am. You're not getting away from me."

I opened my mouth to argue, but suddenly her mouth was on mine and she rendered me quite speechless. "Never," she reiterated during a brief pause…the only break in contact for the next three days.

With the future in my arms, how can I let the past haunt me?

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	3. Sketches

Summary: Alice introduces Jasper to Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, Emmett, and Edward after she sees them in her vision.

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I scrutinized the figure Alice was busily sketching, taking the paper from her when she had finished with it.

"That's Carlisle," she said, speaking his name as if he was an old friend, not someone she had never met. Alice's drawings were so accurate, so intensely lifelike, that if he had not been composed entirely of shades of gray, I would not have been surprised to see him walking toward me out of the page.

His eyes were unmistakably kind and compassionate…his gaze made me feel as though he could really see me, and he was forgiving me for my past, just as Alice had. Despite that, I was still afraid of him. I had not gotten over Alice's acceptance, though I was with her constantly. I could not fathom that there could be another in the world who could look past my scars to who I was trying to be.

"He's a _doctor_, isn't that incredible?" Alice said brightly, smiling at me as I looked up from the man's likeness.

I was shocked. I could barely stop myself from running hundreds of miles for human blood, and he was surrounded by it every day. Clearly, I was not of his caliber. I could never belong.

Alice seemed to sense my unhappiness, and stroked my hand briefly before showing me the next of her renderings. "This is Esme. Carlisle's wife. She'll be our mother."

Again, all I could do was stare at Alice as she discussed our future. She already knew and loved this family. I could still not believe they existed…their goodness was much too far beyond my realm of experience.

"Rosalie," she continued, passing me the next page. "Beautiful, don't you think?" A smirk curled Alice's lips. "And she knows it."

I looked at her. She was undeniably attractive, with her long blonde hair and womanly curves. However, her vain happiness held absolutely no appeal for me. No one could ever compare to Alice. "She's lovely," I conceded, but I put the page aside and claimed Alice's lips with my own. I was still amazed that I had the freedom to do that. "But you are perfection."

Alice's tinkling laugh rang through the air. She kissed the tip of my nose, grinning at me. "You'll be her twin."

That completely lost me. "I'll be…what?"

"When we go to school. You and Rosalie will be twins."

"School?"

She fixed me with a stern expression. "Truancy is frowned upon, Jasper. We are young, after all."

"We appear to be," I corrected. I shook my head, unable to imagine a time when I would be sufficiently controlled to be in a school, with hundreds of humans surrounding me, their young blood pulsing through their veins. I sighed.

"I'll never leave you," Alice promised. "I know you will be able to do it." She winked.

"You know everything," I chuckled, trying to force the dark thoughts out of my head. I concentrated on Alice's brimming elation at the prospect of our soon-to-be family, and it was not so difficult.

"Emmett."

Emmett made me tense up. He looked like a fighter. I still tended to look at all vampires as potential opponents, and this one was undoubtedly immensely strong.

"You'll like him," Alice explained, smiling at me again. "He always wants to fight, just for fun, and no one can beat him." She looked thoughtful. "I think I could, though. If I foresee all his moves, I could win."

"NO!" I shouted, panic seizing me at the very thought of Alice facing down this giant of a vampire. I did not even consider the very real possibility that she was right, and that she would win. I did not care that, if she was right, and she always was, this Emmett would be our brother and he would not harm her. I did not care. Alice was everything, absolutely everything. I would never allow her to be in danger, and I could not bear to think of her fighting. I had seen too many fights, too many hurts. If Alice was injured, if she was not there to fill life with happiness, the world would end.

I did not realize that I was gasping for air, as if I needed it, until I felt her finger on my lips. "Sh, Jasper," she murmured gently, running her other hand through my hair. I did not realize my eyes were clenched tight until I looked for her face and had to relax my eyelids.

She kissed me softly. "I'm here," she assured me, and my heart overflowed with joy as I recognized the truth of that statement.

She turned back to the drawings. "This is Edward."

I took more time to look at that drawing. I felt a kindred spirit already. He looked…tormented. Like me. Carlisle and Esme were utterly overflowing with contented peace, and Emmett and Rosalie were also palpably happy. Theirs was not as pure as that of my…parents…but it was there nonetheless. Something in Edward's eyes made him look desperate, lost.

"What's his story?" I asked. "Is he new to this life too?"

"Actually, no," Alice replied, her forehead creasing in thought. "He was the first one Carlisle changed."

That surprised me. "He doesn't seem as stable."

"Oh, he's not." She sighed, patting the drawn Edward's head in an affectionate way. I smiled. "He's lonely. He actually has more control than any of them, apart from Carlisle."

I pondered that. I did not even want to think about how I'd be if added loneliness to my struggle to not be a monster. There would be no struggle, in fact…instead there would be a complete eradication of any goodness I had managed to foster. I would fail, utterly, without Alice.

"He has what I need, and I have what he needs. Put the two of us together, and you would have one well-rounded vampire."

Alice suddenly launched herself at me and I let us fall to the ground. "I prefer my vampire rough," she whispered against my lips before planting a kiss on my throat.

I flipped us over so I covered her tiny frame completely. "Whatever you want," I promised with a roguish grin. She laughed and pulled me to her.

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Please review! Thank you to those who have so far!


	4. Haunted

Summary: Alice finds Jasper after he almost kills Bella at her birthday party.

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I knew where I would find Jasper. Whenever he came close to slipping, whenever he could feel how easily he could give in and allow his eyes to return to burgundy, he retreated to the same spot.

His choice might have surprised the others. It was a small clearing on top of a cliff, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. It was beautiful, solitary…and it was the site of his last indiscretion.

He always returned to that place, that memory, to drown in the sadness and regret it evoked in him. He remembered the girl's face…for she had been nothing more than a girl, probably twenty years old at the most. He had told me about her many times. Every time venom started flowing in his mouth, her face would flash before his eyes. Her long, curly, light brown hair…her grayish eyes…her rather sharp nose. He had thought she was pretty, as far as humans went.

He didn't mean to do it. He was just so thirsty. He had actually been after a bear, but the girl happened to be in between them. Her scent was like a sledgehammer to his brain, and all his thoughts, all his goals, all his resolutions…they were gone. He killed her and stayed beside her, shaking and rocking, until I found him there. And for a day after, before I finally managed to pull him away.

It was there I discovered him again, as he contemplated how close he had come to killing Bella. He sat on the edge of the cliff, his back to the ocean so he could fix his eyes on the exact spot where the girl's body had been. I could almost see her still, as though the intensity of Jasper's gaze was really enough to bring her back.

His horror, disgust, and embarrassment were palpable. His eyes had a dead look in them that I hated to see, and I had been lucky…I hadn't seen it in years.

I sat beside him, wrapping my arms around my legs instead of his shoulders, as I wanted to. I knew he would flinch away at this point.

I listened to his ragged breathing for a long time. A light breeze rippled through the grass, playing in our hair and making the leaves rustle. The silence that had hung so heavily over the clearing was broken, and Jasper finally spoke.

"Is she alright?" he asked softly, brokenly.

"She's perfectly fine. She's had much worse injuries before." I turned to him. "She specifically told me to let you know she is not mad at you."

He chuckled darkly. "She should be. Edward's right; her instincts are entirely wrong. She should hate me. She should _despise_ me."

"Bella could never be like that. And it wasn't your fault. No one blames you."

He looked at me bleakly, skeptically. I shook my head. "Being raised in the environment you were…you can't blame yourself, Jazz. Do you think Maria could resist for even one minute if a human crossed her path? And you have been surrounding yourself with them for years. You have been in a car with Bella for hours and done nothing. You _love _her. Give yourself some credit."

If his expression softened at all, it was a short-lived change. "_Will_ Bella be alright?"

I knew what he meant, and I couldn't honestly offer him any comfort on that point. "I don't know," I admitted, finally taking his hand in mine and squeezing it. "Edward hasn't made up his mind yet. If we leave…she won't be okay. I know that much, without even seeing it."

Jasper freed his hand from mine so he could take me in his arms. I could feel his depression, as if it was literally weighing down the air. "He will hate me. Without a doubt."

"I don't know…."

I felt him nodding so fervently that I moved up and down, just a little. "He will. If he did something that forced me to be away from you…I'd hate him."

I pulled away. Staring into his eyes, I told him he was wrong. "You could never hate him. You would feel his regret. You would _know_ how sorry he was. And you'd know that he would miss me too."

"Missing someone is hardly the same as having half of your life…more than half…ripped away." He shuddered. "What if…I took that girl away…. Someone loved her. I didn't just kill her. I killed everyone who loved her."

"Jasper." I would not let him think that way. "Stop." I caught his wrists and brought his palms to my lips. "I can't see the past, and we can't change it," I murmured against his skin, "and I don't know yet what Edward will choose to do, but I do know…I _know_…that either way, he will not hate you."

I reached up and stroked the dark shadows beneath his golden eyes, two signs that he was still winning his battle. "And I love you enough for everyone," I added with a smirk. I willed him to bask in my pride in his efforts, Bella's forgiveness, Esme and Carlisle's desperate love for him and their hope that he would not be too angry with himself, Rosalie and Emmett's love, and most of all, my own. And my happiness at being at his side, no matter what.

The pall lifted. I looked back at the grass, and I couldn't see the girl's body anymore. I knew Jasper still could, but it was fading. There was renewed hope in his eyes, even as he ran his fingertips down my neck and whispered, "I'm sorry."

I nodded. "And I love you. That's what matters." I stood and pulled him to his feet with unnecessary force so his body crashed into mine, just to make him laugh. I was not disappointed. "Now let's go fight with Edward and make the case for staying."

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